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Got to mau-mau the flak-catchers once in a while

What weird weather – record highs for February, 70 degrees! It’s actually stuffy at night, but we’re keeping the windows shut because the rice and nut farmers are burning their fields and slash piles out on the west side and you never know when the wind will shift.

I don’t mind the farmers – dirt made my lunch, thank you a bunch. When I was a child and my grandfather had to have his field burned, he loaded us into the canned ham and headed to Fort Bragg for a week. We came home to wash the soot off the window sills.

I looked ahead at Accuweather – they are predicting a few rainy days in March, but nothing like the miracle it will take to make up for this dry Winter we’ve had.

No snowboarding for me this year – I play my Dick Dale records and carve around the apartment, cut some imaginary 360’s in the kitchen, do a jump or two out by the laundry line. I guess I should put my boots on one day just to make sure my feet will recognize them when the time comes. Heavy sigh…

I’ll tell you what – I’ve gained 5 pounds, and that means a couple of pairs of jeans won’t button. Damn you Germans and your lebkuchen! Really, it’s my own fault – January is my sleep month, can’t get excited about much of anything.

Although, tomorrow there’s a 3:30 meeting I’m looking forward to – the Local Governments Committee. It’s a good meeting because it’s a catch-all for issues that are before all the local commissions and boards, from Chico City Council to Butte Stupes to Chico Area Recreation District, and even the mosquito guy will be there.

Did you know, our mosquito board manager makes about $103,000 a year and only pays three percent of his pension?

There are many important issues on the agenda – including a report given by my kindergarten classmate, Dennis Schmidt. It’s fun to listen to Dennis – he still talks with a lisp, and his ears stick out just like they did when we were kids – eee-haw! He’s old and grumpy now, and working for the county, which means he’s up to no good about half the time. He’s the guy who raised the fee on pumping septic tanks, and now he wants property owners to be responsible for hiring their own security patrols for Humboldt Road.

Humboldt Road is a public road and a public disgrace – whole sections of asphalt missing. Here’s my guess – the county and the city are playing hot potato with maintenance of that road, since it goes in and out of the city/county. And, there’s so much illegal dumping up there, you’d think you were at the dump. There’s also homeless camps. Neither the city or the county wants to take responsibility for that stuff, so they are laying it on the property owners? Who pay whopping property taxes.

So Old Juanita has to get on her high horse and go down there and shame them. That’s about it. And I’ll tell you what – I’m not above making fun of a lisp and big ears and somebody who couldn’t tie his own damned shoes in kindergarten.